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| Last week, my inquisitive, four year old son, found that the handle on the piano cover was loose. Being curious, he turned the knob this way and that, until all at once it fell off in his hand. Uh oh. He quickly tried to put it back on but the screw had sunk back into the wood! He tried pushing and twisting it but to no avail, it would not stay on. Now what should he do? He probably shouldn’t have been pulling on it so hard. And even though he knew he was not to play with the piano, he knew he should not be messing around it either! So he ran to find his big sister, who, after careful examination, decided that the problem would best be solved with copious amounts of tape to hold the knob in place. They fixed it there as best as they knew how, and hoped that it would go unnoticed, which it did for a few days.
Last night, I saw the knob was missing and wondered what had happened. My wife said she had bumped against it and it had fallen off so she picked it up and set it on the top of the piano. I took the knob to see if I could get it back on, and noticed all the tape. Knowing that knobs are not in the habit of taping themselves to pianos, I started asking the children who knew what had happened to the knob. My four year old immediately suggested that my three year old might know what had happened to it. But alas, my three year old knew nothing, except that there might be trouble brewing and he didn’t want it coming down on him! After some talking, the story came out and the knob was safely screwed back onto the piano cover where it belonged.
As I lay in bed last night, I thought how often I have responded to life’s problems with the same response as my little son. I am curious about things in life. I want to take it in my hands, twist it, pull it, and move it around, until before I know it, I have pieces in my hands. Now I could run to my Father and ask Him to help me, but so often I find myself running to my friends, or buying a book to tell me how to “fix it.” And through lots of effort, I am able to tape things back together so that to the casual observer, it looks just fine. But the broken pieces are still there. They have not healed, but are simply held in place so that we look good from a distance, but the wounds still run deep.
Oh if only we would run to our heavenly Father! He can take our life’s messes, our broken pieces and know exactly how to fix them and heal the wounds at the same time. Yes, there is correction needed too, but as He mends our broken parts back together, He talks to us, challenges us, and in innumerable ways, loves us as only He can. And when He is done, we are stronger and better equipped to face the work that He has for us.
But why do we run to others before taking the problem to God? Psalms 103:13 says, “Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him.” The definition of pitieth gives the picture of a parent snuggling their child up close, comforting them, and having mercy upon them. Just as I long for my children to bring their hurts, fears, and questions to me, so God longs to be our confidant, to snuggle us up close, and help heal the bumps and bruises that come our way. He loves us too much to just let us go on our way unchanged; rather He molds us and teaches us so that we grow through our trials. But we have to come to Him first.
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It has been a LONG time since I wrote
here and I find that the longer I have children, the less time I have
for this! However, I still want to try to stay on top of this every
once in a while so you will just have to be grateful for what you get
until I can find some “spare-time”! This is the biggest joke around our
house right now, “We’ll do that when we get some spare time!” Usually
meaning that we will get to it in the next 12 years of so.My wife wrote
a while back about our new endeavor this year, that of raising bees for
honey. It has been quite the experience and very much a learning one!
It seems to my father and I that the more we work with the bees, the
less we know! Aimee and I decided to just get one hive this spring and
so bought the equipment, hive bodies, and about 3 lbs. Of bees to get
started, while my father bought enough for 10 hives.
The Lord blessed our hives in the fact that they were able to get up
to full size very quickly and we were all excited about the upcoming
nectar flow! Then we found out what “swarming” was! It seems that when
the bees get really bored or are not finding enough of nectar, they
will make a new queen and just before she hatches, about one-quarter to
half the bees in the hive will all of a sudden take wing and leave the
hive. I would try to explain this sight and sound to you, but it is
incredible to watch and hard to accurately describe!
You have about 50 to 60 thousand bees all just streaming from the
hive and flying up into a column about 20 feet across and 30 feet high.
This make such a loud buzzing noise that you can hear it from a hundred
feet away!. As the queen and her nurse bees move in one general
direction, the whole mass moves with her until she lands on a branch
somewhere and then they all land on the branch and by looping the hooks
on the ends of their legs together, they make a mound of bees with all
the ones at the bottom, hanging from all the bees on the branch.)
We wait until they have mostly clumped up on he branch and then if
the branch is not too big or important, we gently cut it off and carry
the bees back down to the ground. Of all the swarms this year, we have
only had two that were way up in a tree, about thirty feet up a birch
tree here in our yard. When we get down to the ground, we have a new
hive sitting there on a big piece of cardboard with the top off. We
then position the branch over the hive so that when we shake the bees
off, most will go into the open hive and the rest out in front of it.
Because the legs of the bees are hooked together, all have to do to get
the bee’s off, is to gently give it a little quick drop, and the whole
mass drops into the hive. But because they are bees, a bunch of the
will immediately take flight again and you need to quickly get the
cover back on. Then the next part is what really amazes me! They bees
that are out in front of the cardboard, know almost instantly if the
queen is in the hive. If she is, they position themselves facing
towards the hive and fanning their wings to beat the band! The
harmonics of these thousands of bees doing this, as well as the
chemical smell they give off when they have a new home, attracts the
rest of the bees and they will spend the next half hour to and hour,
slowly taking their turns, walking into the new hive.
We currently have 18 hives and have missed three more swarms. It
means that we will not get quite as much honey this fall, but if we
have a good winter, we may be able to sell the extra hives next spring.
On a Garden note.
When we lived in Pa. We struggle so much with potato bugs! We
tried all sorts of sprays and only found one that really seemed to
work, M-1. However when we moved out here, the manufactures of the
spray, quit making it and so we battled the bugs with our fingers and
small cans of gasoline.
However! We heard a couple years ago that if you plant really
aromatic marigolds between your potatoes’, you will have fewer potato
bugs. They were right!! This is the second year in a row that we have
had few if any bugs and they are the biggest and bushiest potato plants
I have seen in a long time!! We planted a marigold plant every four or
five potato plants. It has worked and we are so grateful that we have a
remedy that does not include the use of harsh chemicals! Just an idea
for those of you still fighting these little pests!!
If you are still looking for our other sites, Here is the link to Aimee’s current blog and my main one.
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| I doubt that there is any one who is still reading this due to my long
absence, and maybe the content or ability of this writer. However I have not
forgotten this blog, but have resigned myself to the fact that in the scheme of
Christian life and fatherhood, there are other responsibilities that must come
first.
One of the thoughts that have been going around my head is this; There is
such a strong connection between the image we have of our earthly father, and
the way we see God. I have often seen this in other people but only recently
come to realize what I leaving to my children.
Take for instance the woman who had a very angry father and rarely, if ever,
heard praise or expressions of love from him. She is very prone to see God in
the same light and finds it hard to reconcile the God that she reads in the
Bible, who loves her and cares for her personally, when the only earthly example
she has is giving her a drastically different picture! This is just one case in
point but you get my drift. The children of a loving, adoring father, have a
hard time coming to grips with the unswerving justice and judgment of God,
etc.
My questions that keep running through my head are these. Why would God
choose such failing creatures to imprint a picture of Him onto the soft
impressionable hearts and minds of our children? You heard the old adage,
"Children never really grow up, until they become parents. Then their
children 'raise' them." I have made so many blunders already that I wonder
if I will ever be able to show them more accurately who their Father REALLY
is!! It really can put the weight on you to make sure that you always walk
straight and true to God's truth! Just this afternoon, I found my eldest son
again emulating one of my baser struggles. When he did not get his brother to
comply with his wishes by asking in a normal volume of voice, he ratcheted it up
a notch and used a tone that stated loud and clear that he was not going to be
trifled with in this issue! I reprimanded him for it but found myself realizing
afresh that my children are learning daily, that which I do not seek to
teach!
The second question is this, since I have and earthly and imperfect father,
how do I overcome the somewhat skewed picture I have of God? I have read the
Bible for many years and have found the Lord to be most precious on many fronts,
but I still keep coming back to that same tinted glass view of what I think God
is! I seem unable to see Him from the "other" perspective, or if I do catch a
glimpse, it is always secondary to my original view! Is this the way that God
wants it to be? Is this the heritage I am destined to leave my children?
I so long to see God for who He really and truly is and to then do my best to
exemplify Him to my children. And if I find what God shows me to be a "better"
way, how do I implement that without hurting my earthly father or thinking less
of him for his humanness?
Truly the weight of fatherhood is not to be taken lightly, but it pains me so
to see the imperfect shadow that I am leaving behind and that they will have to
walk in! Oh God, help me walk true!! | | |
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Lee Justin Hess (23) of Trail, MN died in an automobile accident at
10:40 P.M. on Dec 19, 2006. He was born in Centralia, IL on January 24,
1983.
Lee assisted his family in grain farming in Northwestern MN. He was
a member of Kitchi Pines Church near Pennington, MN. He has
participated in mission and relief projects in Pakistan, Indonesia, and
Thailand on several occasions.
He is survived by parents, William L. and Carol J. Hess, two
brothers, Philip (21) and Kurt (16), three sisters, Judith (13), Laura
(11) and Pearl (9). He is also survived by paternal grandparents,
Oliver F. and Dorothy M. (Witmer) Hess of Russellville, KY and maternal
grandmother Elva (Keens) Martin of Kell, IL. He was preceded in death
by his maternal grandfather Elmer G. Martin.
Viewing will be on Dec 26th from 6-8 P.M. at the Evangelical Covenant Church in Bemidji, MN. Funeral services will be on Dec 27th at 10:00 AM. at the same location followed by interment at the Wildwood Cemetery near Pennington, MN.
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I want to thank all of you for your
prayers for our little niece, Regan. I just got a call this afternoon
from Loren, her dad. The lab at Johns Hopkins found that the tumor is
a “poly??? ?????.” I repeated the words to him several times but
couldn’t get them right and don’t want to confuse you here. The tumor
was neither malignant, nor benign. They did another CAT scan today and
everything looked really good. There is still a little more fluid in
the brain sack than the doctors like, but it probably took a long time
to build up, and will take a while to shrink back down. They will NOT
have to leave a stint in for drainage! This is a big blessing since
that would have been a major source for potential infection.
As far as Regan goes, she is on the road to a rapid recovery. She
spent quite a while today walking around the halls pushing a little toy
shopping cart. Loren said that he believes that her peripheral vision
is better now than it was before the surgery in the fact before, she
would often walk into things, counters, tables and such, and now, she
avoides them with ease. She went up to the therepist today and they
said to take her home and keep letting her do the things she has been
doing and she will get along just fine. The only thing that she made
need help with is a speech therapist for some of her slurred words.
That may disappear on it’s own, but they are not sure.
Loren said that they were getting ready to go home this afternoon
and we praise the Lord for that!! The doctors are pretty sure they got
the whole tumor but she will have to be watched regularly for the next
20 years.
Loren doesn’t know that I am going to write this, and if you don’t tell them, they won’t be the wiser.  " class="wp-smiley">
As many of you know, Loren and Kendra felt God leading them to move
further south and buy a farm earlier this summer. I know personally
that their strength, endurance, and finances have been stretched to the
max. I asked him the other day if he had any way to pay for this
incident and he said that they were still a part of a brotherhood aid
and they would be helping to pay for most of it. However I know that
they had to hire help for the farm while they were gone, and numerous
other expenses of being gone for a week from the farm. If you would
like to help them out financial, please email me for their address, or
if you want to use a credit card via PayPal, please send it to my email
address of jaimee@paulbunyan.net and write a note to be included with the gift. I will then download it to my bank and send them a check.
Thanks again for all your prayers!! Loren testified that they could feel God’s presence with them the whole time.! PTL!
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